


Major Character Death

by hailingstars



Series: Febuwhump [5]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Cold, Crying, Death, Febuwhump, Grief/Mourning, Snow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 21:31:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17670467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hailingstars/pseuds/hailingstars
Summary: Ned Leeds was Peter's best friend. Was, because he's gone now.orTony warms Peter up even when he rather stay numb.





	Major Character Death

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry I killed Ned. Enjoy the angst.

The water below the Brooklyn Bridge was more of a grave than Ned’s actual burial site or tombstone. Water snuffed out his breath before the dirt incased his body, and when Peter sat up on that bridge, with his feet dangling in air, he could almost still hear him screaming. If he screamed. Peter didn’t know. He wasn’t there. 

Spider-Man had been too busy with other things when the Leeds car flew off the bridge and plunged into the water below. 

Peter wondered if the water had been cold when Ned drowned, like he was, sitting outside in the mid-January, as flakes of snow fell and melted into the river. He hadn’t brought a jacket with him that night, so snow also melted on his bare arms, on his pajama bottoms, and in his hair. He passed feeling cold, though. Instead he just felt numb, and that was sort of the point. 

He didn’t want to feel the full weight of life’s tragedies, especially not when his mind was racing with all the possible scenarios that happened with Ned’s family that day in the car. On the nights he visited Ned at the sight of his death, he liked to torture himself with trying to figure out how his friend’s last moments played out. 

He thought about Ned’s parents, if they sat in the front two seats, holding hands and promising Ned and his sister everything would be okay as their car sunk and water slowly started leaking in, or if it was chaos, if they were frantic trying to bust the windows out and escape. Maybe, they were dead before the car hit the water, from the impact of the guard rails, and Ned was the one to have to comfort his little sister while they were trapped in a car with their dead parents. 

Mostly though, he just wondered the exact moment when Ned lost faith that Spider-Man was coming to rescue them, when he realized his best friend abandoned him and left him to drown. 

“Peter.” 

He didn’t turn to acknowledge the voice, or the car door that slammed. He kept his eyes in the water as footsteps got closer, crunching a thin layer of snow into the concrete as they approached. It was undoubtedly Mr. Stark standing above him when the footsteps stopped. This was routine, too. 

“Get up.”

His words were always short, always orders, but even if Peter resented them, he knew they weren’t unkind. That didn’t mean he listened. He still wasn’t looking at Mr. Stark, still wasn’t acknowledging that he wasn’t alone on the bridge. 

“If you don’t get up off this bridge on your own, I’m gonna have to shoot you with the tranq again, and nobody wants that.” 

That particular night hadn’t been the best, and Mr. Stark was right, Peter didn’t want to repeat it.  
He looked up at Mr. Stark, dressed in a coat, in a scarf, but also in pajama bottoms. He had the blanket in his hands. It was grey and silky, almost metallic, and Peter hated it. 

“Please leave me alone,” said Peter. He knew better, but he still had to try. 

“No.” 

Peter put his hands on the cold, snowy concrete and lifted himself up. Mr. Stark walked forward, wrapped him in the blanket, and the warmth was immediate. It was heated somehow, even if it wasn’t evident where the heat was coming from just by looking at it, and Peter was thawed out by the time Mr. Stark led him to the car and gently pushed him inside. 

Tears came with the warmth. He couldn’t stop them from forming as Happy drove them away from the bridge and he was forced to abandon Ned again. 

*

When they got to the penthouse, Peter was shoved in front of the fireplace. He was left alone, only briefly, only for the amount of time it took Mr. Stark to grab a towel. He attacked him with it, tousled it through his hair as Peter as he ducked and squirmed in place. 

“Stay still.”

“Mr. Stark I can dry my hair by myself.” He whined, but he did go limp. It took too much energy to disagree with Mr. Stark, and he decided it wasn’t energy well spent. 

“Uh huh, and that would require you to take your arms out of the blanket,” said Mr. Stark. “Which you’re not going to do.”

Peter rolled his eyes. He was warm, had been warm since being wrapped in the blanket back on the bridge, but Peter didn’t know why he was surprised. This was routine, too. Mr. Stark always insisted he stayed swaddled inside the heated the blanket for way longer than necessary. It was like a prison, one that made him feel and think things he didn’t want to feel or think. 

Spider-Man without his guy in the chair. Peter Parker alone at Midtown, walking through the halls, and sometimes, crying in the bathroom, by himself. Ned at the bottom of a river, pale and ghostly and floating but never rising to the surface. Never again, not anymore. 

Reality might have been worse than all his thoughts. In the moment he was Peter Parker, sitting in Tony Stark’s living room, staring into the fire and crying in front of Iron Man and wishing he were still frozen so he didn’t have to deal with any of it anymore. 

“It h-hurts, Mr. Stark.” 

“Yeah.” He lowered himself, sat next to Peter on the floor, so close they were sitting side by side and touching. “Listen, I know you’ve worked this out in your head to somehow make it your fault, but it isn’t. Just because you can prevent a tragedy doesn’t mean you can prevent every tragedy and it doesn’t make them your fault.” 

That wasn’t the first time Peter heard this speech, or at least, some version of it. Just like all those other times, Peter didn’t believe him, but he didn’t argue. He stayed quiet. He watched the fire, and the tears still came.   
“I should’ve told you that,” said Mr. Stark “When we first met. I’m sorry I didn’t.” 

“I just miss my friend,” said Peter. He was tired of talking about blame. Just wanted Ned back. He only had that one friend, and now he was gone. 

He missed all the same they built together, too. There was a massacre of Lego creations the week after Ned and his family drown in the East River. He’d been so angry, too angry to look at them anymore, but now, now he regretted it. He’d do anything to get them back. They were gone forever, lost to the world, just like Ned. 

Mr. Stark didn’t try to offer any more comforting words. He was wise like that. He knew there was nothing he could say that he hasn’t already said, or that would make him feel any better. Peter, if he was being honest, could appreciate that about Mr. Stark, that he didn’t try to fill the silence with meaningless words. 

Instead he guided Peter’s head to lay on his chest, between his shoulder and neck, and let him cry it out until he was empty of tears and warm, which, if Peter was being honest, was better than being numb, anyway.


End file.
